Our Journey Together

We are a Christian community rooted in the sacred mystery of God revealed in Jesus Christ. What holds us together is not agreement on every question, but a shared life of love, reverence, and belonging.

Our Communion

We seek communion—

with God, who calls us into ever-deepening relationship and guides us by God’s Spirit;

with one another, across our differences, in mutual respect and grace;

with ourselves, honoring our journeys as sacred and unfolding;

and with the non-human creation, embracing God’s beloved world and all its creatures as holy companions.

In all things, we strive to walk humbly, act justly, and love deeply—trusting that Christ meets us not at the edges of agreement, but at the center of a shared table.

Our Hope

We are still learning what it means to live together as a community centered on Christ. We do not always embody the welcome, grace, and communion we proclaim, but we trust that God continues to call us toward a deeper and more generous life together.

Our hope is to become a community increasingly shaped by worship, listening, learning, forgiveness, and service—where differences need not become divisions, where questions can be asked without fear, and where love takes visible form in compassion and justice.

We trust that this work is never finished. It is a life we receive, practice, and grow into together.

Our Banners

Each year, our congregation gathers around a ministry theme, which is stitched onto a banner displayed in our worship space. As the year unfolds, we create and add patches marking significant moments in our common life—baptisms, weddings, ordinations, seasons of the church year, acts of service, and other occasions of celebration, sorrow, and change.

These patches do more than record events. They express our conviction that God is present and active in the ordinary and extraordinary moments of our life together. By making these moments visible, we learn to recognize God’s faithfulness, give thanks for what has been, and remain attentive to what God may be doing among us.

We sometimes speak of the banners as the stained glass windows of our community. Like stained glass, they tell a story through images and color. But theirs is a story still being made, shaped by the people and experiences that become part of our shared life.

Our Roots

East County Church of Christ was established in 1972 in East Multnomah County, Oregon, the community from which we take our name.

Our congregation grew out of the Churches of Christ tradition, a nondenominational movement within Christianity that has emphasized the centrality of Scripture, the shared life of the church, and the weekly celebration of the Lord’s Supper.

Like every living community, we have been shaped both by our inheritance and by the questions and experiences that have challenged us to grow. Over the years, our understanding of welcome, belonging, and participation in the life of the church has continued to deepen.

We remain grateful for the tradition that formed us, even as we seek to discern faithfully what it means to follow Christ today.

What is a Church of Christ?

Churches of Christ are part of the Restoration Movement, which developed in the United States during the nineteenth century with a desire to recover the shared life and practices of the early Christian church and to seek Christian unity.

Local Churches of Christ are self-governing; there is no central authority that determines the beliefs or practices of every congregation. Many share an emphasis on Scripture, baptism, weekly Communion, and congregational singing, often without instruments. Yet congregations differ in how they understand and practice their faith.

At East County, we value this heritage while continuing to listen, learn, and discern together what faithfulness to Christ asks of us today.